


Valentines-Lady

by sugarby



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Aged Up, Banter, F/M, Milkshakes, Overwatch - Freeform, Valentines, diner
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-31
Updated: 2017-05-31
Packaged: 2018-11-07 02:09:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11049099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sugarby/pseuds/sugarby
Summary: The diner inside makes present outside seem fantasized, nonexistent. Adrien doesn't hate this holiday, or even strongly dislike it, but it’s nothing to celebrate alone.This is when he spots her. This is when he comes to the counter to order but sees her from the corner of his eye and orders nothing. Here, in the diner, sitting by herself in a booth near the back by the window, looking as if hope picked her up and dropped her in the same second, is Marinette Dupain-Cheng. Seeing her here and by herself—on a night like tonight—how can he not go over to her?





	Valentines-Lady

**Author's Note:**

> *Not necessarily a sequel to [Singing-Lady](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11027031) because this can be read by itself, but it's totally fine to accept it as a sequel set some time after.   
>  *Inspired by the sixth episode of 13RW.*

His throat is dry and it’s infuriating. And to be infuriated on a furiously warm evening is even worse. This guy, Adrien Agreste, has a need for a cold, sweet drink. The kind dedicated to fighting heat and encouraging unhealthy addictions; the kind almost too thick for a straw but somehow perfect that way. A drink as overrated as it is deserving of it and not enough praise can be given.

Milkshakes hit that craving spot.

Adrien stands across the road from his preferable diner. It’s cherry-red paint licked across the lining of the roof and the bottom where it ends at the pavement seems fitting for tonight—on Valentines evening. Every direction he turns his head, there’s decorative proof of the holiday. Heart-shaped balloons, heart-shaped cookies, heart-shaped paper cut out and hanging about, heart-themed goodies--if it could pass as a heart, it was likely there. Being in Paris—the place anyone else from a different side of the world calls the _City Of Love_ —amped up by a hundred.

_ Bzzz. Bzzz.  _

   
Adrien takes out his phone and reads the latest from his number one recipient, Chloe Bourgeois.

   
**_From: Chloe_  
**_Happy valentines, Adrikins!! Have a gud 1 Xxxxxxxxxxxx ( ˘ ³˘)❤_

   
Adrien thinks ‘yikes’. His childhood friend never usually uses emojis--once said they’re childish. She must be serious then. His thumbs text back a reply in record time.

   
**_To Chloe:_  
**_Thanks, you too :) so, plans?_

   
He should’ve seen her response coming, setting himself up like he has.

 **_ From Chloe: _  
** My place, 2 minutes? Netflix and...more ;)

The implication—no, the Honest-to-God promiscuity discomforts him. Chloe’s been good to him—from when they were young, which is the problem. He doesn’t know for sure if they’re just not a good match, but it’s hard to stomach the idea of her in a romantic way after knowing her for so long. And she’s a bit too full on. Still a friend, though. Adrien’s teeth sink down on his bottom lip, nervous about his response.

 **_ To Chloe: _  
** _Raincheck on Netflix? JUST netflix. Sorry, Chlo, Valentine’s day isn’t my thing._

   
**_From Chloe:_  
**_Try it first, frady-cat._

 **  
_ To Chloe: _  
** _Can’t if I’m a ‘frady-cat’, meow. Raincheck? :)_

   
**_From Chloe:_  
**_My favourite snacks next time you see me or else!_

   
_**To Chloe:  
** With pretty bows on the bag, promise._

   
He knows the place—a confectionery store alongside an avenue. They sell their products at high prices, in pretty wrapping paper. Nearby is a card store stocked on stick—bows. For a wealthy, picky heiress, she’s easy to please.  
  
Adrien slips his phone in to his hoodie’s pocket and crosses the road. He ducks under the light rainfall, shields himself from the reflecting light spread across parked car fronts and rooves. He enters the diner; it’s same old interior design free of anything heart-themed relieves in. The diner inside makes present outside seem fantasized, nonexistent. Adrien doesn't hate this holiday, or even strongly dislike it, but it’s nothing to celebrate alone.  
  
This is when he spots her. This is when he comes to the counter to order but sees her from the corner of his eye and orders nothing. Here, in the diner, sitting by herself in a booth near the back by the window, looking as if hope picked her up and dropped her in the same second, is Marinette Dupain-Cheng. He shouldn't intrude In her zone; nothing’s his business. Seeing her here and by herself—on a night like tonight—how can he not go over to her? He slides in to her booth on the other side before she’s even fully looked up and realized. In front of her is a finished glass of milkshake—and hey, he thinks, great minds think alike. But the cherry usually added on top of a whip of cream is left cradled in the bottom.  
  
“So, Miss. Dupain-cheng," Adrien starts while he plucks the cherry from the top of her milkshake. "What's your story? Why're you sitting by yourself? Especially on tonight."  
  
"What about you?"  
  
"I asked you first."  
  
"Are we kids now?"  
  
Adrien holds up a finger while from behind, magically, he whips out a pen and swipes the back table's napkin. He clicks the pen down, scrawls on the napkin and pushes it to her. ' _ARe WE kiDs nOW?'_ is next to a circulating drawing of an iconic cartoon character. This particular one who lives inside a fruit under the water. Adrien laughs against the fist propped up and beside his mouth.  
  
"A _meme_? Are you serious?"  
  
Adrien re-positions himself in the booth, sticking his elbows out while his hands are on his hips and he leans over. He's clearly about to do it.  
  
Marinette throws a hand out and is barely holding it together, "No, no, please!" She laughs some more, uncovered and free. “Please, stop."  
  
"Well, you did say please." Adrien settles and sits properly. "But seriously. You? Alone on today? I mean...'cause, like, don't know. I just can't imagine—can't believe—"

“How pathetic I look drinking milkshake by myself."  
  
"No. _No_. Even though the milkshakes here are pretty good."  
  
"Is that really how you're choosing to proceed with your defense, Mr Agreste?"  
  
"It is. Please let the record know I can drink two—no, _five_ of them by myself, no problem."  
  
"I'll have to hold you to that and see sometime."  
  
"So you will. But for now, a different way to measure my _amazing strengths_ ,” Adrien grins and his fingers are dancing on the edge of the table eagerly. Then he moves to the counter to order. He comes back with two milkshakes and pushes one across the table. “For you, M’lady.”

“What is this?”

“Milkshake.”

“I know but what’s it doing _here_?”

“Go ahead and ask it.”

“ _Adrien_.”

Adrien grins shamelessly. His joke was lame but a mildly irritated Marinette has a cuteness to it he couldn’t pass up quite easily. Rolling up the sleeves of his hoodie, he says, “I wanna see who can drink theirs the fastest. We go on three, okay.” He isn’t asking, he’s insisting they go on three—that this be a thing that actually happens. A milkshake drinking completion in a near-vacant diner of Valentines day.

“Adrien, _no_. God, no.”

“One, two—”

 “I’ve already drank one, I’m half-full! This is unfair!”  
  
“Three!” Adrien drinks immediately, going for a smooth win.

Marinette finds herself forsaking protest and throwing herself in to her milkshake, drinking with everything she's got—everything she didn't know she even had and could give to such a game.  
  
Adrien drinks with means to win but it’s possible he adjust his speed slightly, slows down—to have more time to play this game with Marinette, to have more time to watch her. They’re in a child-like game he practically made up on the spot, and she protested it. Marinette’s plenty of nice things like sensible, honest...and _nice_  itself. She’s trying so hard—her best in this game created by a big-kid for a girl he has a big spot for. (Chloe would never agree to it. Adrien can’t even picture her drinking a milkshake—with its thick calories and untraceable sweeteners. She’d let him play by himself. She’d offer to pay the bill, would believe he could drink it in record time and even brag about him, but she’d never be _part_  of it.

The milkshake drinking completion closes with Adrien victorious: twenty seconds. Marinette finishes over a minute and has to hold her head where a buzzing pain is coming.

Adrien relieves, reclining against the booth, "You play a hard game but it looks like I'm still the reigning champion."

“Yeah, of a game you _just now_ invented.”

“Someone’s a sore loser.”

Marinette wipes her mouth of some remaining milkshake, “I’m sure being reigning champion of this game gets you extra brownie points on scholarships.”

“Duh. You think a pretty boy like me got in to his first-choice college by studying hard? You think I had time to? Ohh, now, see, that's _stereotyping_.”

“I’m sorry for thinking you were hardworking and deserving of your place.”

“It’s cool, just don’t let it happen again. How would you feel if I thought you were a good girl who makes her mother and father proud?”

“The nerve! How dare you?!"”

“See? It isn't nice to assume, is it?” Adrien says in a scolding tone but a grin is blatantly on his face, a laugh is threatening to come out and in crescendo.

Marinette sits back, holding her stomach. “I’ve lost in two ways. Stomach-ache.”

Adrien holds his hands up, “Full responsibility is on me.”

“Oh, it _definitely_ is.” Marinette confirms with a sly smile. Her stomach-rubbing slows, “...But it was fun. _I had fun_. You made tonight...kind of ideal.”

"Chugging down milkshakes is my ideal date, too. And gaming—hey, we should play Overwatch! I think we'd be awesome on a team tog—”

"Date?" Marinette had heard little else after that particular choice of word, even if it was carelessly used. “I didn't know this was..."  
  
"N-No, I meant it as a…um—just as a figure of speech. You know?”

“R-Right. Of course—’course you did.”  
  
"Yeah..." Adrien knows he’s ruined the mood. The merciless silence that comes doesn’t fill in any blanks on that. He points to their empty glasses, "Um, you...you wanna go again? Try and claim my title?"  
  
"Am I unlikable? Is something wrong with me?"  
  
_'No. God, no. I like you as you are.'_ Adrien thinks but doesn't full-on confess. "I can overlook you not being able to finish yours fast enough.

" _Adrien_."  
  
"You're not—you’re not and nothing’s wrong with you. Don’t do that to yourself.”

“...I think I got stood up.”

"By who?"  
  
Marinette stays silent.

“Marinette, who—”

“It doesn't matter."  
  
"It matters to me."

Marinette doesn't respond. 

Silence takes over their booth, sends them away in to a completely separate world from the diner a few people are cohabiting with them. The silence is brief but silence can feel like a lifetime where someone wants to say so much and doesn't.  
  
“Hey...is it alright if I invite you back to my house?"

“Where’s...where’s this going, Adrien?"

Adrien shakes his head, “It’s nothing like _that_ , I swear. Just...will you come?”

Marinette spends a lot of time looking at him as she thinks—looking at the boy who says and does the weirdest but sweetest, wittiest things and most of them are sweet in her memory, on her heart. _ ’Does he know?’  _  She wonders. She nods and they stand together, leave together with their hands so close to holding. ' _ Does he know it’s bitter-sweet being in his company, expecting something to happen as well as nothing?’  _

 

**_. . ._ **

Marinette’s first words in his home are ironically about how she can’t give her opinion on it—not this soon, anyway. She scans as much as she can with a single twirl as they reach the ascending staircase that looks like it belongs in a Disney movie. “You have a nice place...is what I would say if I wasn't being deprived of a grand tour.”

“Next time.” Adrien promises, going up the stairs, leading her to his personal domain.

Marinette sighs and follows him. She still looks at whatever she can while she can, “I will say, though, that your staircase is white enough to make a polar bear insecure. And your house—sorry, this _mansion_ makes you the Bruce Wayne of Paris.”

“That last one is a compliment, I’m sure.”

“If you like things big, sure.”

Adrien gives her a suspicious looks, but with teasing intention. “...As in…?”

“Oh my God—no, that’s not—I didn’t mean it like that!”

Adrien steps closer and asks her seriously, “So you _don’t_ like _big things_? Hm, kinda disappointed, gotta say.”

Marinette blushes furiously. “ _Please_! Be merciful and forget what I said.”

“Alright.” Adrien says, and it slightly breaks the curse of humiliation upon Marinette. “Well, there’s my room.” At the top of the stairs now and across from his bedroom, he points to it. But he turns in the opposite direction. “I’m gonna get everything ready for us to set up and play.”

“Play what?”

“Overwatch.”

“How can we both play? It’s—”

“Gonna borrow my father’s computer and monitor and hook it up next to mine. Be ready to play in ten!”

“Need any help?”

“I’m good, thanks.” Adrien shoos her away in the direction of his room, “Go, really. It won't take me long.”

It really doesn't. It doesn't take long to set up two monitors and computers side by side each other—on the ground, though, where it’s more fun for them to play. But it also doesn't take long for them to settle in his bedroom—a once imagined place by Marinette who hadn't been in until now. They sit together at the foot of his king-sized bed, holding the controllers they’d hooked up in place of keyboards, and they join a quick-play match.

Two matches later, Marinette says, "I don't get it."  
  
"What's not to get? Take over the area and keep the payload moving while trying not to get killed. The only hard part is—argh, damn it!” Adrien exclaims, hands up and everything, then rethinks his explanation, “The only hard part is Zenyatta hitting me over and over with his...crazy, dumb balls!”

Marinette gives a weird look, “No, not that. And I get you’re not a decent Tracer main.” She says, which Adrien exclaims a protest over. “But I’m talking about today. _Valentines_  day. Shouldn't it...isn't it possible to show love on any and every given day? Why settle for a specific one?"

“Guess it’s for people who’re too busy on a general basis to prove they understand at least the concept of love. Like my father.”

Marinette nods, slightly agreeing on the part about people maybe being too busy to show their love thoroughly."...Was your father...um, did he and your mother ever, um, do a-anything special on—"  
  
"Marinette, stop."

Marinette closes her eyes, shamed. “I shouldn’t have—I’m sorry...”  
  
“What? No,” Adrien reassuringly puts his hand over hers for a second “I mean stop moving the payload, they've set a Bastion up ahead. Let’s take him out first."  
  
“O-oh. Right. Yeah, I-I see him…” Marinette stays quiet as she resumes focusing on being D.Va. She knows he hasn't answered her question and she understands why. “My Parents went out for dinner. They have reservations at someplace fancy. I’m happy they still do that. Go on dates, get excited on Valentines day.”  
  
"Must be nice." says Adrien.  
  
"Didn't anyone ask you out, Adrien?"

“Chloe invited me over for...well, her intentions were obvious. They always tend to be when I’m involved, but, it’s not my thing. I mean, call me deep and profound—call me _old_ \--but I think this Valentines day stuff is better with someone I connect with on a real, personal level. Someone I’m totally open and expressive with and not awkward and anxious. Well, I mean, if the love of your life doesn't make you feel that way, hey, something’s not right. But what I mean is I want someone who’s...someone who’s—oh, watch out, Marinette, they have a Mei on their team!”

Marinette doesn't say it but she’s skeptical. What connection is realer and deeper than one sprung from childhood? She’s jealous. She wonders—hopes if the girl who sings in bars, botches her sentences when she’s full of too many emotions, laughs at memes and fails to finish her milkshake the fastest can have such a connection. She speaks, under a quiet breath, “...Someone like me?"  
  
The blast of someone’s ult goes off, ringing in the room.  
  
“Uh wh—huh?” Adrien’s dazed, caught between seeing how many teammates were just killed. “Sorry, you say something?”

Marinette is frozen, shocked by her own suggestion—for saying out loud. “...Some...s-some...tea.” she deceives, “Want some t-tea? D-Do you want—’cause I can—”

“Don't be silly. I should be offering you, it’s _my_ house.”

“Right, haha…” Marinette laughs forcibly. “It’s your...big, _Wayne-manor_  mansion with the _very white_ staircase.”

 Adrien chuckles, genuinely.

 Their team wins, the word victory appearing over a swirly splash of light shades. Play Of The Game goes to the Mei player for her quadruple blizzard kill—to which Adrien contests in a snort. On the next screen of notable players for their mentionable contribution, Marinette as D.Va who blocked over two-thousand hits of damage and Adrien as Tracer with a kill streak show up. Before it goes away, a number pops up on Tracer’s placard.

Marinette asks, “Did you just one-up _yourself_?”

“No one else did!”

“Someday. When you hurry up and git gud.”  
  
"No way, you did not just say that!"  
  
Marinette puts her hands on her hips and mimics oddly, "NO waY yOu DiD Not JuSt SAY That."  
  
Adrien pushes a pillow in to her, grinning, while she laughs and lets herself be tickled by the pillow-ends. "I still believe in what I said.” he pulls his legs to his chest and rests the pillow on his knees. “And tonight's been pretty great with you."

"What? No, Adrien, _you_  made _my night_! If you hadn’t seen me—and _stayed_ —I wouldn't—" she’s instantly silenced by Adrien taking her hands and holding them...without saying a word. She feels frozen again. Her next movements are stiff, gently and appreciatively grazing over his knuckles with her thumb. She feels an explosion of emotions right in her heart, beating all around in her immobile body, “...Is this the part where I play along as your girlfriend? Then we fight and I take you for pastries and to meet my parents?”

Adrien exhales a soft chuckle. He won’t forget that night. Helping her, finally talking to the pretty girl with the nice voice. Right now, he could tell her that all those things she just mentioned are possible and they wouldn’t have to be ‘playing along’. It could be real. They could be. “Hey, so...if we're both still in the position of drinking milkshakes by ourselves next year...wanna drink together?”

“You me with go—I-I mean us d-date go, uh, on milkshakes?!”  
  
"I kind of understood that. Err, no. A date is...I mean, if you don’t want to because it might be weird for us to, you know...I’d—I think I’d understand.”  
  
"Why? Do you not like me like that?"  
  
"I asked you first."  
  
"Still a kid." Mariette says but holds up a pink finger. "But you've got a deal, Adrien Agreste."  
  
Adrien stares at her. It's unfair to hope Marinette remains single until he summons enough courage to change that, but he secretly does wish it. He and her, their milkshakes and their game they made of it and just being together. By uniting his finger with hers, by securing the vow he's agreeing to continue wishing a nice girl like her endures another year alone.

“What?" Marinette tauntingly wriggles her pinky, "Scared I'll take your title next year as fastest milkshake drinker?"  
  
Adrien snorts, "Not a chance but you can dream on." The self-debating in his mind hushes. With a smile and a promise to himself to be braver, he wraps his finger around hers.

**Author's Note:**

> *More often than not, my endings become open with a TBC feeling. So, maybe I did set myself up to write this sequel—and now, maybe, even another but I’ve got no ideas yet. What if your own imagination of how things play out from here on suffices more? Have at it, folks.   
>  *I wouldn’t say I _hate_ Chloe. She is somewhat of a friend to Adrien (even though she sucks in general with everyone else). Or I tried to write her that way.   
>  Thank you a whole lot for reading this, I really appreciate it and hope it’s a decent story.


End file.
